The Italians: Cristiano, Vittorio and Dario: Once a Ferrara Wife... / A Dark Sicilian Secret / Blackmailed Bride, Innocent Wife

‘Sì, because the one thing I really feel like doing right now is dancing the night away.’ But this time the sarcasm was blunted by concern as well as exasperation. ‘I am a man who learns from his mistakes, tesoro. Last time I walked away when you needed me, although in my defence I didn’t realise how bad it was—’ His eyes never left hers.

‘You just can’t do it, can you?’ Laurel took a few difficult breaths. ‘You can’t … apologise.’

The corners of his mouth flickered. ‘For once I’m relieved you have the breath to argue. And, as for an apology—I’m getting closer by the minute.’

‘Don’t bother. It’s too late to make a difference … I already hate you.’ Laurel closed her eyes but not before she’d seen a tempting hint of bronzed skin with the cluster of dark hair hinting at what lay beneath his shirt.

It didn’t help that she knew exactly what lay beneath. She could picture it, every tempting curve and dip of his muscles, the taut flat abdomen and the firm thighs. He was the only client she’d ever had whose physique she hadn’t been able to improve.

‘You don’t hate me, tesoro.’ The assurance with which he spoke those words should have angered her because she’d always hated the way he accepted people’s respect and adulation as his due. He didn’t just walk into a room, he commanded it and that natural assumption of power had exasperated her.

Her throat tightened again, but this time the response was nothing to do with her asthma.

‘Go, or there will be gossip.’

‘I’m not even going to respond to that.’ His arm brushed against hers although whether by accident or design she didn’t know. ‘Do you need to inhale this thing again?’

She opened her eyes.

He still held her inhaler in his fingers and she shook her head.

‘Maybe in a minute … And if you don’t go back, Dani will notice.’

‘When Dani sees that both of us are missing she’ll assume we’re together. She’ll be opening champagne and congratulating herself.’

‘That’s what worries me. Go.’

‘You really think I’d leave? I learned that lesson two years ago.’

The irony of it would have made her smile if she’d had the energy. ‘Two years ago I wanted you—now I don’t.’ Her lungs were improving, the desperate fight for air eased by the medication. ‘I’m not a hypocrite. I chose to leave this marriage so I can’t expect you to hold my hand just because I’m scared. Not that I’m saying I’m scared.’

‘Of course you’re not. God forbid that you would ever admit to vulnerability. Tell me something—’ his tone was conversational, as if they hadn’t just been engaged in a blistering row ‘—have you ever leaned on anyone in your life?’

‘I leaned on you.’ And you weren’t there.

Hearing those unspoken words loud and clear, his jaw tightened. ‘I asked for that one.’ He sat down on the floor next to her, his broad shoulders pressed against the wall. The sleeve of his jacket brushed against her bare arm and Laurel felt the connection deep down in her soul. She hadn’t expected him to stay.

‘I don’t remember inviting you to sit down.’

Ignoring her, he leaned his head back. ‘You’re the most aggravating woman I’ve ever met, you do know that, don’t you?’

‘You talk to me of aggravating?’ She didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. ‘When I needed you most you were nowhere to be seen and now I don’t need you I can’t get rid of you. That’s aggravating. Go back to your other women, Cristiano.’

‘Which one? According to you, I have a harem.’

‘I’m sure any one of them would provide you with the slavish adoration you need.’ Laurel felt the solid warmth of his arm pressing against her. He smelled so good, she thought dizzily. Her senses were heightened, her skin tingling and her nerve endings buzzing. Recognising the danger signs, she felt a stab of alarm. She needed him to leave. Either that or she needed to leave but she didn’t have the available breath. Or anywhere to go. ‘Your problem is that you think women are a homogeneous group. You think we all think and feel in the same way.’

‘You’re wasting precious breath spouting rubbish.’ ‘You think we’re an inferior species.’ He threw back his head and laughed at that. ‘Is that the best you can do to pick a fight? Now I know you’re feeling bad.’

‘I just want you to go.’

‘Sì, I know.’ His voice was low and rough. ‘But I’m not going anywhere.’

‘I find it stressful you being here.’

It was a moment before he answered. ‘Why?’

The sounds of the night intruded on the silence. The rhythmic chirruping of the cicadas and the soft swish of sea on sand. Romance intruding where it had no business.

‘A million reasons.’

The tension pulsed between them and Laurel pressed her hands to the ground, intending to lever herself away from him, but his hand clamped over hers.

‘Name one.’

‘Because our marriage is over. And because you always want everything your own way. There, I gave you two.’ She tugged, but he was stronger. ‘Let me go. My legs are numb. I need to move.’

‘Of course you do. Whenever the conversation becomes uncomfortable you want to move. Usually as fast as possible in the opposite direction.’ He levered himself to his feet. ‘I’ll allow you to go as far as the bed.’ Without giving her the opportunity to argue, he scooped her into his arms.

‘Oh, for goodness’ sake—I can walk. I don’t need all this macho stuff. I’ve told you, it does nothing for me.’ Her breathing felt strange again but this time she knew it had nothing to do with her asthma and everything to do with being this close to him. She wrapped her arms around his neck, telling herself it was just for support. Nothing else.

The doors were open to the beach and a slight breeze cooled the air as he laid her gently on the bed.

He removed his jacket and slung it carelessly over the sofa. Then he piled the pillows up behind her. ‘Better?’ At her reluctant nod his mouth tightened. ‘When did your asthma become this bad? In all the time we were together I only saw you have an attack once and that was when my pilot had to make an emergency landing and some fool told you about it.’

She didn’t even want to think about the terror of that day. Not now, when she was working on forgetting what they’d shared in the past. ‘You and I were in the middle of a huge project. I didn’t want you dying and leaving me with all the work.’

The corners of his mouth tilted in appreciative humour. ‘Of course. You were worried about the workload. It wasn’t because I rocked your world.’

‘I didn’t see enough of you for you to rock my world. At the most you were a faint tremble.’

‘So if I had so little impact on your life, why did you pack two inhalers to come to this wedding?’

‘Are there two in my bag?’ She feigned surprise and his lashes swept down over his eyes, concealing his expression, but not before she’d seen the flash of exasperation.

‘I wish you would learn to be honest about your feelings.’

‘I wish you would learn not to let your feelings spill out. I suppose I have to make allowances for the fact you’re Sicilian.’

‘Allowances?’

It was a relief to know she could still irritate him. Two minutes, she thought, and then he’d be ranting in Italian and storming out. She was relying on it. ‘Being Sicilian is a handicap in life,’ she murmured sympathetically. ‘Being emotional is welded into your DNA. You can’t help it.’

‘Not everyone is afraid of emotions.’ He undid the cuffs of his shirt in a slow, deliberate movement. ‘But you are. Terrified. Two-inhalers terrified.’

She wondered why he was removing his jacket when what he should really be doing was redoing his bow tie and returning to the party.

When she remained silent he raised an eyebrow and dropped his cufflinks onto the small writing table that faced the sea. ‘What, no comeback, Laurel? No incendiary statement designed to make me walk out? That’s what you want, isn’t it? Do you think I don’t know that?’ The sleeves of his shirt flopped over his strong hands and he folded them back and pushed them up his arms. She remembered those arms holding her and immediately looked away, rejecting the powerful surge of need. She’d always found it unfair that someone with such a casual attitude to his appearance could look so good in every situation.

‘You can stay or go, I don’t care. I don’t need you.’

‘Need and want are two different things.’ He looked at the inhaler clutched in her palm. ‘So your attacks are brought on by stress. That’s interesting. You weren’t stressed when we were together.’

‘As I said, that’s because I never saw you,’ she said sweetly. ‘I’ve seen more of you in the last twenty-four hours than I ever did during our marriage. Probably why I’m stressed.’

‘I’m stressed too. You are enough to drive a man crazy.’ His low drawl connected with her insides and suddenly that melting feeling low in her pelvis was back.

‘You only have to survive my company until Sunday. My flight leaves first thing in the morning.’

‘We have a meeting with the lawyers tomorrow morning.’

‘I don’t need to speak to them. Agree whatever you want and it will be fine by me.’

The mattress moved as he sat down next to her. ‘If you’re that angry with me then this is your chance to bleed me dry.’

‘It was never about the money, you know that.’

‘I don’t know anything because you never share anything. A relationship with you is one big guessing game.’ He sounded tired and witnessing that was a thousand times more unsettling than his anger or sarcasm because she’d never seen him tired. Cristiano had more energy than any man she’d ever met.

‘If you’d been around more you wouldn’t have had to guess.’ On that terrible day—the day he’d missed—her feelings had been there for all to see. Except the only witnesses had been the staff of the private hospital. Competent but brisk, they’d had no idea of the extent of her desolation. ‘I’ll fly home tomorrow. The last thing you need right now is your ex-wife at your sister’s wedding.’

‘Wife.’ The words were soft but firm. ‘You’re not my ex-wife.’

‘Soon will be.’ It was so dangerous, being this close to him. She didn’t dare look at him. Didn’t dare move in case she brushed against him, so she held herself rigid.

‘Your breathing is better.’

‘So now you can go back to the party.’

He didn’t rise but he did give her a warning look. ‘I’ll sleep on the sofa in the living room. Leave the door open. If you need anything you can call out.’

A lump settled in her throat. ‘Honestly, you don’t need to do this. Just go and answer the thousands of emails that will undoubtedly be waiting for you on your phone.’ She didn’t want him to behave decently now. It was too late.

‘So now you’re giving me permission to be insensitive?’

Yes, because anything different would complicate her feelings and she didn’t want that.

Her mind was straight. She wanted it to stay straight.

Laurel gave a shrug that was supposed to indicate that she didn’t care what he did. ‘If acting like a guard dog makes you feel better about yourself then at least let me be the one to sleep on the sofa.’

‘Why? I can sleep anywhere, you know that.’

She did know. In the middle of tough negotiations there had been nights when he’d slept in the office to avoid coming home in the middle of the night and waking her. ‘In that case, do whatever pleases you.’

When he reached out to switch off the lamp by the bed she caught his arm. ‘Leave it.’

It was such a cliché, but she hated the dark.

On her own, she always slept with a light on. Only with Cristiano had she been able to feel safe at night.

He frowned, his gaze steady and disturbingly perceptive. ‘I’ll stay with you for a few minutes, just until I’m sure you don’t need a doctor.’ As he pulled off his shoes and settled on the bed next to her she wanted to ask why he was doing this. Why he was he staying with her when they were no longer together. When it was much, much too late for their marriage.

They sat together in silence, close but not touching. As her breathing grew easier and the panic lessened, so her awareness of him grew. The length of his powerful thigh next to hers and his deep, even breathing. The connection between them, that dangerous indefinable chemistry that should have died along with her dreams, sprang to life.

Slowly, she turned her head and looked at him.

He turned his head too and his eyes fixed on hers.

Both should have looked away but neither of them did.

The inevitability of it was as sweet and sharp as the desire that stabbed through her body.

His hand lifted and his fingers dragged lightly over her jaw. The stroke of his thumb over her lower lip was gentle. When he lowered his head he did it slowly, as if he wasn’t sure he was actually going to follow through. His mouth brushed against hers. A teasing prelude. It was insane and she should have moved, but she couldn’t. Anticipation exploded inside her. For a few thrilling seconds his mouth hovered close to hers and then he lost his grip on control and took her mouth in a hard, devouring kiss that blew every thought from her brain. She tried to hold herself back, not to become involved, but his kiss drew her in until they merged, until she couldn’t tell where she ended and he began, until her whole world centred on what they became together. His tongue was in her mouth, his hands in her hair and they feasted on each other like animals driven wild by deprivation. It was intoxicating, the rush of sexual excitement as heady as any drug and just as dangerous.

Time passed unnoticed and then he gave a growl of self-denial and dragged his mouth from hers, regret visible in every plane of his handsome face. ‘No.’ The raw emotion in his voice reflected her own feelings.

‘No.’ The kiss had shaken her and it was no consolation to know it had shaken him too. This wasn’t what she wanted. She wasn’t trying to tempt him back. She wasn’t trying to instigate a reconciliation.

Her future didn’t include him and yet now everything was stirred up inside her. And even while she was cursing herself a tiny rogue part of her was thrilled at the fact he’d given in to temptation because she knew he exercised ruthless control over his impulses. She’d wanted this encounter to be difficult for him but what they’d just done had made it a thousand times more difficult for herself.

Laurel pulled away, dizzy with the contradictory thoughts that fought for supremacy in her head. She didn’t want him to want her. She didn’t want to want him. How was that going to help? It was just going to make an already difficult situation worse.

Cristiano sprang from the bed, lithe and supremely fit. ‘You’re right. I should sleep on the sofa. If you need a doctor in the night, call me.’ With that terse instruction and not even a glance in her direction, he left the room, leaving her body buzzing and her heart breaking.

CHAPTER FOUR

‘CRISTIANO, are you even listening to me?’

Cristiano turned, disconcerted to realise he hadn’t heard a single word his lawyer had spoken.

He’d left the villa at sunrise, attempting to relieve his rocketing tension levels with a punishing run before the warmth of the new day turned to blistering heat. After that, he’d swum. Then he’d caught up on his emails.

Nothing had deleted thoughts of Laurel from his brain.

He wanted to see her as the heartless bitch who had treated their marriage vows as nothing but instead he kept seeing her, pale and vulnerable as she struggled to breathe, stressed out of her mind by being back with him. Accustomed to handling a variety of emergencies on an everyday basis, he’d been appalled by the panic that had gripped him witnessing her struggle for air. He’d been perilously close to summoning every doctor on the island.

Every doctor except the idiot who had assured him that it was common for a woman to have abdominal cramps and that it was unlikely she’d lose the baby.

Anger shafted through him, but the strongest emotion was one of guilt as he acknowledged the damage he’d done by choosing to prioritise a critical work issue over her well-being. The fact that he’d grossly underestimated the seriousness of the situation didn’t excuse him. The fact that the advice of another had proved ill-founded didn’t excuse him either.

His mind was full of questions, the answers to which should have been of no interest or relevance at this stage of their relationship. He wanted to know since when her asthma had been that bad. Whether she’d been having attacks in the time they had been apart. He knew she’d suffered since childhood. It was one of the few things she’d told him about herself when they’d first met.

He knew that, for her, stress was the trigger.

If last night was anything to go by, she was under monumental stress.

Acknowledging the part his own behaviour had played in the onset of her attack, Cristiano ran his hand over his face. He couldn’t believe his own lack of control. From the moment he’d met her at the airport, his temper had been simmering dangerously. The relationship was over. It had been over for the past two years and yet the moment he’d seen her again the only thought in his mind had been, She’s my wife. Mine.

Until he’d met Laurel he’d considered himself to be a modern male—well, as modern as a Sicilian man could be. The past twenty-four hours had forced a stark rethink of that overly generous self-analysis. Every dark primitive thought that had haunted his brain had taken him right back to his caveman ancestors. Jealous? Yes, he was jealous. Jealous as hell and the knowledge sat in his gut like some thick, sickening poison slowly seeping through his body, contaminating every thought.

He didn’t want her moving on.

He didn’t want her making a new life that didn’t feature him as a central character.

His lawyer cleared his throat and pushed a file across the table to him. ‘I emailed you a document. The fact that you refused to declare a separation of assets on your marriage or a pre-nuptial agreement theoretically leaves you exposed.’ ‘I don’t care about the money.’

‘Well, you’re lucky. Apparently neither does she.’ Carlo pulled another set of documents out of his briefcase. ‘Her lawyer has said that if we can expedite the divorce proceedings, she is happy to walk away with nothing.’

The evidence that she was prepared to sacrifice anything and everything to get away from him exposed another layer of his base masculine instincts. Did she hate him that much? ‘What did you tell him?’

‘Her.’ Carlo flicked through the pages until he found the one he wanted. ‘Her lawyer is a woman. And I told her that in Sicily a couple have to have been separated for three years. Today is really just a formality. An opportunity to talk in person, given that you haven’t seen each other for two years.’

Talk?

When had they talked? Cristiano rubbed his fingers over his forehead but nothing relieved the ugly throb in his head. He’d hurled recriminations at her and she’d reacted in her usual way—erecting more walls and barriers between them. She deflected everything he threw at her.

Her passionate accusation that he’d demanded that she open up and trust him, only to abandon her when she needed him still echoed in his brain.

He had let her down. But did that excuse her decision to walk out on their marriage? Not in his book.

Trying to escape from the uncomfortable throb of his own thoughts, Cristiano strode over to the window. Why, when there were millions of women who couldn’t stop talking about themselves and their feelings, had he picked the one woman who refused to do either?

He knew that the miscarriage had devastated her and yet she resolutely refused to talk about it.

Perhaps the initial error had been his, but she’d shown no inclination to forgive him or accept any of his conciliatory gestures. Flowers, diamonds—she’d been too busy packing her suitcase to look at them.

His behaviour had been bad, but was it unforgivable?

‘Laurel sent a message that she couldn’t make this meeting because she’s helping Dani—’ Carlo was obviously trying to be tactful ‘—but I’ll get the papers to her for her signature at some point today.’

Interrupting a wedding for a divorce.

The irony of it didn’t escape him. He’d already briefed his pilot to be ready to fly him to Sardinia as soon as he could reasonably extricated himself. But first he had to get through the ordeal of his sister’s wedding. And so did Laurel.

He hoped she had more inhalers packed in her suitcase because if stress was the trigger then she was going to need them.

He turned, feeling less in control than he would have liked. ‘Do what needs to be done. I have to go and play ringmaster to this circus.’

Carlo’s lips twitched. ‘When I saw the flowers and the little white ponies I thought I’d stepped into a fairy tale. It’s typical Dani.’

‘My sister is obsessed with happy ever afters.’ But Laurel wasn’t. She didn’t believe in happy ever afters. He still remembered how, during their wedding, she’d kept touching him to check it was real. His hand. His face. Tell me this is happening. That I’m not going to wake up.

For a brief moment he’d never seen anyone so happy and it had given him a real high to know that he was the one who had won her trust. A high, quickly followed by a stomach-swooping low when it had all gone so badly wrong.

For Laurel the ending hadn’t been happy.

It had been one gigantic car crash.

‘It fits perfectly.’ Dani stood back and studied Laurel. ‘You look beautiful.’

‘We both know I am nowhere close to beautiful but thanks anyway. You, however, do look beautiful, which is a good job given that you’re the bride.’ Laurel smiled and fussed over her friend, hiding her pain behind activity. ‘You’re the one everyone is looking at.’ Thank goodness. The truth was she didn’t want to be wearing this pale silk sheath and carrying a small posy of sunny yellow gerberas. Not only did they not match her mood, but they reminded her too much of her own wedding. A day she was desperately trying to push from her memory.

She and Cristiano had married in the private chapel that had been in the Ferrara family for centuries. They’d married on a rush of impulse and a breathless tumble of happiness.

Dani had opted for a wedding on the beach attended, it seemed, by half the population of Sicily.

Laurel was relieved that this wedding was going to be so dramatically different from hers. There would be nothing to trigger uncomfortable memories. No nostalgia here. She just needed to get through it and go home.

Fortunately Cristiano had left the villa before she’d woken, which had spared them both another agonizing encounter. But now she was dreading the moment when she laid eyes on him again. He seemed determined to rake over the past and she had no wish to do that.

And as for that kiss—

So the man could kiss. That didn’t change anything. A kiss wasn’t love.

Hands not entirely steady, she adjusted Dani’s veil. ‘Are you ready?’

‘Oh, yes. You?’

Never. Laurel smiled. ‘Absolutely. Let’s do it.’ Let’s get it over with, then I can go home. Her flight was booked for the next day. All she had to do was survive the wedding, the dinner and one more night in the villa.

She would concentrate on her friend. She wasn’t going to look at Cristiano.

If she needed distraction then she’d think about the fitness programme she was putting together for a client struggling with her weight. The woman had suffered serious health problems and it had been a challenge to devise a programme that would gradually build her strength without putting too much stress on her body.

It was the part of the job she loved most. Helping people grow fitter. Improving their lives. Showing them that they could make good choices.